. >>> and the end of mardi gras ushers lent season with pope benedict leaving the church. nbc's chris jansing is inside the vatican where the audience with the pope is about to get under way. chris, good morning. >> reporter: good morning, to you, mara. in half an hour, we will get the first viewing of pope benedict since he made that shocking decision to step down. this is an audience. and it is the first of what will be several appearances before his last day as pope which is february 28th. later today because it's ash wednesday he will be saying mass. normally, it's held in a very small church near here but it's been moved to st. peter because of the expected demand for attendance. and then on sunday, he will come out on the balcony which is the traditional sunday, and after that there are expected to be very few appearances by pope benedict, as you know, made the decision because he's becoming increasingly frail over the past several years and months to step down. so we'll be looking in the knicks half hour to see how he seems to be doing, how his health is. and again,